“Fiddle-de-dee’s not English.”

X/1999 Volume 1: Prelude by CLAMP
Viz Communications Inc (2002)
200 pages

Eh, this manga. I don’t know why I’m even bothering writing something about it. When I started this book blog, I said to myself, “I’ll blog about each book I finish, even the cookbooks!”, and that is why we find ourselves here.

But who doesn’t know what X is about? The world is ending, choose your sides. That’s basically it.

Except not.

(OK, notes: Names are in the “given-name family-name” form, spellings are romanised as translated by Viz. Yes, I still do a double take at “Fuma” — I did start with the scanlations and I’m more attached to those, but I’m one of those people who stick to the rule that if you quote from a source, quote it directly, warts and all, and since this is based on the bound volume I have, so. I immediately switch to scanlation spellings and honorifics once I get to fanfics, though. I never claimed I was consistent, haha.)

The story starts with young Kamui Shiro, who is returning to Tokyo after being away for six years to face his destiny. Kamui has superpowers. Really. His childhood friends, Kotori and Fuma Monou are surprised when Kamui is so stand-offish towards them when he returns, insisting that they keep away from him. We have people chasing after Kamui, and we see him use his awesome powers. We have no idea why any of this is going on.

That, friends, neighbours and minions, was a terribly sucky summary.

The artwork is pretty — that’s a definitely plus. The characters are pretty. The story is dark — they don’t try to mask it as something cheery even this early in the series. The plot isn’t really coherent at this point, though it does get more interesting later. I refrain from saying that it’ll get more coherent later — I’m not sure that is the truth. (I’m writing this with the knowledge of what comes 17 volumes after. This whole commentary is not written without bias.)

Kamui is such an arrogant kid. I’m not saying that I never noticed this before, but upon reread he seems almost unbearably so. Kotori is really sweet — I wonder what fandom has against her, really. Fuma, Kamui and Kotori were cute as young children. And they got along so splendidly too. Oh well.

Sorata makes an appearance at the end! ♥ Sorata is my favourite character. Which probably means that he is doomed, but we’ll just have to see, since the series’ end is nowhere in sight.

Oh, did I say this is a work-in-progress, currently on hold? Yeah, so now you know.

Also, award for most random sound effect goes to “ZLOSH!” I think that was the wind slashing at something, hmm.